BBC announces Guy Pearce will star as Ebenezer Scrooge

The BBC has announced that Guy Pearce will star in the lead role for their adaptation of A Christmas Carol set to air December 2019.

Other stars have already been announced but the actor playing the main character was kept quiet. Screenwriter Steven Knight (Peaky Blinders) has since announced to the BBC that Guy Pearce will play Ebenezer Scrooge alongside Andy Serkis (Lord of the Rings), Stephen Graham (Line of Duty) and Charlotte Riley (Peaky Blinders).

Andy Serkis will play Ghost of Christmas Past and Rutger Hauer (Bladerunner) is the Ghost of Christmas Future, while The Ghost of Christmas Present is yet to be announced.

The BBC announced the 3-part series, saying it is going to be a “haunting, hallucinatory, spine-tingling” take on the Charles Dickens classic.

“We’re incredibly excited that filming has begun on Steve Knight’s brilliant interpretation of A Christmas Carol, with Nick Murphy directing a phenomenal cast in what promises to be an iconic version of the classic tale.”

The series is brought to us by the same team behind the scandalous and kooky BBC historical drama Taboo starring Tom Hardy. Although Hardy is an executive producer on this latest version of A Christmas Carol, and was once said to be set to star in the BBC adaptation, he is no longer named among the cast.

Guy Pearce seems to a tad young for such a curmudgeonly character, however there is hope that he will bring some grit and realism to the story.